The Alpenglow
by Powerhouse411
Summary: When Chrom and Lissa find a lad lying unconscious in a field, they can't help but to chuckle at the similarities between him and their beloved Robin. Though Robin may NOT be happy about having an expy and Frederick is as wary as ever, it isn't long before the lads finds himself enlisting into the Shepherds alongside a lass with an Earthstone of all things...


_"__Chrom, we have to do something!"_ somewhat heard Aaron as he reluctantly roused himself from the best sleep he's ever had.

_"What do you propose we do?"_ heard Aaron next, this time with perfect clarity. Though the significance of what he was hearing had yet to dawn upon him.

_"I__-I__ don't know,"_ was the last straw. Now Aaron knew **exactly** what was going on and, truth be told, was pretty excited about it. Immediately Aaron opened his eyes...

...and was greeted by the sight of **four** people. Chrom, Lissa, Frederick, and an individual whose appearance was suspiciously similar to that of a female avatar whom he had once pitted The Shepherds against.

"You guys are a riot, you know that?" snorted the individual, much to Chrom and Lissa's amusement. Frederick's expression bore none of the mirth that his charges were relishing in. Instead it was as blank as freshly bought printing paper. As if the Great Knight was in the middle of a round of poker.

"Grr," Aaron half-heartedly hissed at Frederick while swiping at the air between the Great Knight and himself in a manner which was reminiscent of a livid kitten. "I'm hella dangerous so you best be on your guard! Grr!"

"It has yet to be seen whether or not you're a threat to my lord- and ladies-of-liege," grumbled a flustered Frederick more to himself than to Aaron, a flush of embarrassment rising to his cheeks as he did so. "So I shall be keeping a **close** eye on you,"

"I see you're awake now," snickered Chrom, prompting an indignant huff from both the individual and Frederick.

"Hey there," greeted Lissa in a stifled giggle. By this point, Aaron was well aware that Chrom and Lissa were outright parodying their meeting with the avatar. In spite of the fact that he was not exactly fond of the idea of being the supposedly uninformed subject of an inside joke, Aaron decided to play along.

"There are better places to take a nap than on the ground you know," said Chrom a moment before he offered a helping hand to Aaron. "Give me your hand,"

Without hesitation, Aaron accepted Chrom's offer. He took the Great Lord's hand within his own, and then allowed himself to be pulled to his feet.

"You all right?" asked Chrom seriously, letting go of Aaron's hand as he did so.

"Y-yes," answered Aaron, intentionally in a stammer. "Thank you, Chrom,"

"It's official now. This entire situation creeps me out," murmured the individual to Frederick at a volume which would have made the murmur inaudible to Aaron if he didn't have the hearing of an attentive cat. "It's feels like I'm being replaced..."

"Ah, then you know who I am?" asked Chrom with a cheeky grin on his face, obviously amused by how "coincidental" Aaron's choice of words were. Aaron took a look from the corner of his eye and saw that the individual was cringing. It was then that he decided to bring an end to the festivities.

"Who doesn't?" rhetorically questioned Aaron with a shrug. Much to Aaron's satisfaction, the individual sighed in relief at his choice of words.

"Give me a break!" pouted Lissa with a stamp of her foot. "You were **this** close to being **exactly** like her! What a let down,"

"Considering the fact that he's Chrom and you're Lissa..." begun Aaron before pointing a finger towards Frederick and then the individual herself. "...that makes you Frederick and you Robin,"

"Being able to identify the Exalt and his sister is one thing.." started Frederick, his expression darkening with suspicion as he did so. "...but being able to identify military personnel is another! Who are you?"

"I, Frederick the Wary, am-"

_"NO! PLEASE! NOT MY DIC-AHH! WHY NAGA? WHY?"_

"I think Southtown is under attack," murmured a disturbed Robin, prompting Chrom to raise an eyebrow.

"You **think**?"

"Well, you never know..."

"Hesitation spawns death!" suddenly declared Aaron in a manner that was as over-dramatic as it was loud, baffling the Shepherds into an awkward silence as he did so. Immediately afterward, Aaron helped himself to an iron sword – which Chrom had been keeping as an alternative to "sullying the sanctity of the Falchion" as Rosemary put it – and then struck a Kamina-esque pose. "Either your own or another's! So I'm off. Wish me luck, my sheep-tending compatriots!"

"Wait!" futilely called Chrom as Aaron sped off towards Southtown with naught but the clothes on his back and the iron sword he'd managed to pilfer from Chrom. Chrom slammed the palm of his hand into his face as loudly as he could. With a groan, the Ylissean prince leapt onto the rump of Frederick's steed and then commenced to shout out orders. "Frederick! Get me to Southtown as fast as you can. Preferably before our daring friend manages to throw himself to the wolves. Robin, Lissa! I want the both of you to catch up to us as soon as possible, but take special care not to exhaust yourselves!"

"What? No! C-Chrom, wait a min-" was all Lissa managed to say before Frederick spurred his destrier into a gallop which managed to take Chrom and him out of both their hearing ranges within the span of a few seconds. Lissa sighed at the males' departure before turning to face Robin. To Lissa's surprise, Robin appeared to be lost in thought.

Under normal circumstances, such a sight wouldn't had bothered Lissa in the least. Robin was **always** thinking about one thing or the other. To the point where it was practically expected of her to be too caught up in her contemplations to give reality so much as a passing glance. However, this was no normal circumstances.

Under a normal circumstance, Robin's daydreaming was accompanied by a facial expression which was as devoid of emotion as the deceased themselves. Or at least those amongst the dead who hadn't been corrupted into risen by the Fell Dragon, Grima. Yet at the moment, there was an out-of-place frown on Robin's beautiful face. Without a shadow of a doubt, Lissa knew that there was something **wrong **with her friend. And she intended on getting to the bottom of it.

"Hey Robin, you don't seem like your usual self. What gives? Is something the matter?" asked Lissa with the straightforwardness of a slighted bull. Lissa then begun to repeatedly tap a foot upon the ground as she waited for the zoned-out Robin to realize that she had just been spoken to. After about a minute, Lissa couldn't help but to smirk at the sight of Robin's pupils visibly dilating. A telltale sign of the fact that Robin was returning from the dark depths of that brilliant mind of hers.

"L-L-Lissa!" groggily stammered Robin upon her arrival to reality, earning herself a chuckle from Lissa as she did so. "I-I-I'm fine. Thank you for your concern,"

"Fat chance Robin," pouted Lissa as childishly as she could managed. Surprisingly, such childishness was beyond even the capacity of Nowi of all people! "You know as well as I do that I'm not going to let you off that easily. So, you might as well fess up! What's bugging you?"

"I'm sorry Lissa, but Chrom has given the both of us a direct order. We should really-"

"Oh that's perfectly fine. You'll just have to tell me on the way there. Such a feat shouldn't be too difficult for the tactician whom defeated Walhart and his Valmese Empire," interrupted Lissa in a singsong tone of voice. Robin blinked a couple of times before slumping her shoulders and then sighing in defeat, indicating to Lissa that the battle had been won.

* * *

"_Yes, __yes,__yes! Come forth! Come to her, foreign one! Come to the Fell Dragon's most humble priestess. Come to Grima's Celibate!_" heard Aaron whilst he was sprinting along the cobblestone streets of Southtown in search of the brigands whom had apparently decided to set the town afire during the time it took for Aaron to arrive. Strangely enough, it was not from his surroundings that Aaron heard the sound. Rather, it was from the most abysmal depths of his consciousness. From the layer of thoughts where information was conveyed as sensations rather than words. From the boundary between the mind and the soul itself.

To say Aaron was disturbed by this, would have been the overstatement of the century. In truth, it wasn't even physically possible for Aaron to give any less of a damn about the voice that had decided to take residence within the confines of his head. Not because Aaron was some sort of a badass or anything Marty Stu-ish like that. Rather, it was because just about the entirety of Southtown was on freaking fire for Naga's sake! Though Aaron may not have been on fire himself, he was still burning like a dinner that the teenager "forgot" to take out of the oven. Believe it or not, convection is a bitch like that. Needless to say, the last thing on Aaron's mind was an inexplicable voice.

"Got me one!" suddenly heard Aaron. Before Aaron could so much as decide whether or not what he'd just heard had been of a physical or mental origin, an arrow embedded itself into the very center of his chest. Aaron couldn't help but to howl in agony while the force of the arrow's embedment roughly dropped him onto his back.

With several grunts of pain, Aaron rolled onto his side and then curled himself into the fetal position. As much as he was loath to do so, Aaron twitched for a few moments before abruptly becoming perfectly still. As he did so, Aaron internally prayed to God that his attacker simply assumed he was dead rather than put another arrow into his body for just-in-case purposes. It wasn't long before Aaron's ears were graced with the anticipated sound of footsteps accompanied by a heartless snicker.

"Thank you my LORD," prayed Aaron with a thought during the very moment that his attacker – an enemy unit of the archer class – begun to search him for valuables. Without so much as a semblance of a warning, Aaron sprung his trap. Like a snake striking from beneath a rock, Aaron's right arm rocketed towards the archer's throat.

The archer couldn't help but to wheeze as he suddenly found himself being choked by a man whom was supposed to have been dead from an arrow to the chest. To the archer's sheer horror, it wasn't long before he also found himself gurgling on his own blood as Aaron's fingers **slowly** begun to press their way **into** his throat. It was as if they were fangs...

"I'm guessing this would classify as a critical hit!" hissed a thoroughly pissed off Aaron as he plunged the blade of Chrom's iron sword into the very center of the archer's chest. After about a minute of gurgling and erratic convulsions, the archer's body became as still as a stone. Needless to say, the archer was dead. What does need to be said though, is that Aaron was not taking any chances. Preferring to learn from the mistakes of others just as much as he learned from his own, Aaron let go of the archer's neck and then quickly utilized the Spin Attack from the Legend of Zelda to decapitate the archer. Just in case.

"_Well done, Drake'Sire! Well done! Now, to claim your prize! Grima's Celibate awaits you my liege!_"

"What the hell was I thinking?" murmured Aaron to himself as a question towards the wisdom of charging into a real battle for no reason other than the fact that he had the opportunity to do so. Aaron shook his head at his own stupidity. He then extracted the arrow from his chest whilst he still had the adrenaline to do so.

Feeling empowered by the aforementioned adrenaline, Aaron decided that he should finish what he started. If not for the innocents he might save by doing so, then for his pride as a man who took his principles seriously. Unknowingly to Aaron, it was neither of those things that compelled him to move onward. But something far more sinister...

* * *

"I've never seen a man run so fast..." murmured Frederick more to himself than to Chrom as the both of them finished the journey to Southtown not long after Aaron's arrival. Immediately, Chrom hopped off of Frederick's steed and then withdrew the Falchion from its scabbard since his alternative sword was currently in the hands of Aaron.

"You'll be seeing one die just as quickly if we don't make it to him in time," said Chrom in response. Chrom then burst into a sprint along Southtown's stone roads. Frederick nodded in agreement with Chrom's response before he spurred his mount into taking after Chrom...


End file.
